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Home > Mark Bradley > Archives > 2008 > December > 31
Wednesday, December 31, 2008
Georgia should’ve been better than Capital One Bowl - but wasn’t
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Orlando — Mark Richt stood in a hotel a block from Sea World and told the fib coaches always tell. “Very happy to be here,” he said, and we all know that isn’t true.
Georgia should have been too good for the Capital One Bowl. Even with its schedule and its injuries, this should have been a BCS team at worst. Yet here the Bulldogs are, about to play in a second-tier bowl that seems both an afterthought and an abject mismatch.
A Detroit writer posed the first question at Richt’s media briefing Wednesday: Can Michigan State stay on the field with Georgia? “Come on,” said Richt, bristling. “I don’t think that’s a very good question, quite frankly. And that’s with all due respect to you.”
Then this: “Their record is the same as ours, in-conference and non-conference.”
And there’s the rub. Michigan State received 21 points in the preseason Associated Press poll, which would have placed it 35th if the ratings extended that far. Georgia drew 1,528 points and was ranked No. 1. Indeed, Wednesday’s USA Today contained this damning sentence: “Michigan State’s Big Ten campaign was similar to that of Georgia in the SEC, with no bad losses but not close against the league’s front-runners.”
Michigan State’s preseason aim, coach Mark Dantonio said, “was to get to a New Year’s Day bowl.” Georgia’s goals were beyond, but the Bulldogs never came close to realizing them. They were outscored by 31 points in a half against Alabama and by 28 in a half against Florida and by 26 in a quarter against Georgia Tech. When the going got tough, too often these Dogs cut and ran. They had everything except resolve.
Regarding this bowl, willpower seems the only real consideration. If Georgia wants to play, it will win big. But can a team that began the season ranked No. 1 rouse itself for a bowl known best for being staged near the Happiest Place on Earth? (“The greatest entertainment in the world,” said Richt, speaking of Disney and its ilk.)
“When you don’t reach your goals, it can be tough to motivate,” said Richt, who maintained his team’s practices have been spirited and forceful. “I’ve never seen our guys go in the tank,” he said, presumably forgetting the first half of the Sugar Bowl against West Virginia.
The recent history of this curious bowl is that the SEC entrant arrives disappointed and leaves dejected. The plodding Big Ten has won the past four Capital Ones: Iowa over LSU; Wisconsin over first Auburn and then Arkansas, and Michigan over Florida last season in a game that left the Urban Crier utterly exasperated. Even on Jan. 1, 2004, a Richt-coached team that had won the SEC East wasted a late lead and needed overtime to subdue Purdue here.
“Our theme has been to send these seniors out the way they deserve to go out, and also that this is the beginning of 2009,” Richt said. “I don’t think those ideas conflict.”
They don’t, but they do. Because there’s a strong chance Matthew Stafford and Knowshon Moreno, neither of them seniors, won’t stick around after the Capital One. What tone can be set for next fall if they’re in the NFL?
“We’re excited about this game and excited about the future,” said Richt, perhaps telling the truth this time. And earlier, thinking back to August, he’d broached the topic of what might have been.
“Entering the season with people saying you should be No. 1 makes it more of a topic of national discussion when you’re not,” Richt said. And then this: “I’d a lot more rather be No. 2 than No. 1.”
That’s no longer an issue. His underachieving team is No. 16 — three spots ahead of Michigan State.
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